a) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a chair assembly designed to be of maximum comfort and sturdiness in a vehicle such as a locomotive, which shakes and vibrates when in motion.
b) Brief Description of the Prior Art
Heavy vehicles, particularly locomotives of the type in use today have limited space in the cabin. Thus it is not easy for the driver or other personnel to get into or leave the driver's seat. In addition, it is sometimes necessary for the locomotive driver to look out the side window for some railroad work such as yard stitching.
Accordingly, it is known to provide a seat which is slidably mounted on a rail so that the seat can slide forwardly or rearwardly in the cabin. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,118,062 issued on Jun. 2, 1992 to one of the instant inventors, Mr. Archambault, teaches the use of a seat attached to the side wall of a locomotive driver's cabin in a cantilever manner. The seat that can be easily adjusted horizontally along a rail attached to the side wall of the cabin, is pivotally mounted on a vertical axis by means of a threaded shaft extending into a threaded sleeve which allows the seat to be raised or lowered by turning the same.
It has been found that such a mounting of the seat with a threaded shaft extending into a threaded sleeve is unsatisfactory. Over a period of time, the threaded shaft and threaded sleeve tend to wobble and become loose due to the movement of the locomotive described above. This becomes a major source of discomfort and back pain especially when the train is on a long trip.
Moreover, for the yard switching mentioned above, the seat disclosed in the above patent cannot be moved laterally. As a matter of fact, it is mounted at a fixed distance from the side wall of the locomotive. This results in an undesirable stretching and twisting of the back when the driver wants to look out of the side window.